---
id: failure-detection
title: Failure detection - Temporal feature
description: Explore Temporal's robust timeout and Retry Policy features for Workflows and Activities. Start with our tutorials or dive deep with our SDK guides and Encyclopedia resources.
sidebar_label: Failure detection
tags:
  - Workflows
  - Activities
  - Timeouts
  - Failures
  - Errors
keywords:
  - temporal timeouts
  - application failure detection
  - automatic failure mitigation
  - temporal retries
  - workflow timeout configuration
  - activity timeout configuration
  - temporal retry policy
  - temporal sdk tutorial
  - temporal sdk feature guide
  - go sdk workflow timeout
  - java sdk workflow timeout
  - php sdk workflow timeout
  - python sdk workflow timeout
  - typescript sdk workflow timeout
  - detecting workflow failures
  - detecting activity failures
  - temporal retry policies
  - temporal courses
---

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In Temporal, timeouts detect application failures.
The system can then automatically mitigate these failures through retries.
Both major application function primitives, **Workflows** and **Activities**, have dedicated **timeout configurations** and can be configured with a **Retry Policy**.

**Follow one of our tutorials to [Get started](https://learn.temporal.io/getting_started/) exploring timeouts and Retry Policies.**

Or jump straight to a Temporal SDK feature guide.

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    <RelatedReadItem path="/develop/typescript/failure-detection#workflow-timeouts" text="Set Workflow timeouts and Retry Policies using the TypeScript SDK" archetype="feature-guide" />
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  <RelatedReadItem path="/develop/python/failure-detection#activity-timeouts" text="Set Activity timeouts and Retry Policies using the Python SDK" archetype="feature-guide" />
  <RelatedReadItem path="/develop/typescript/failure-detection#activity-timeouts" text="Set Activity timeouts and Retry Policies using the TypeScript SDK" archetype="feature-guide" />
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For a deep dive into timeouts and Retry Policies visit the following Temporal Encyclopedia pages or enroll in one of [our courses](https://learn.temporal.io/courses/).

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    <RelatedReadItem path="/encyclopedia/detecting-workflow-failures" text="Detecting Workflow failures" archetype="encyclopedia" />
    <RelatedReadItem path="/encyclopedia/detecting-activity-failures" text="Detecting Activity failures" archetype="encyclopedia" />
    <RelatedReadItem path="/encyclopedia/retry-policies" text="Retry Policies" archetype="encyclopedia" />
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